I hate waiting.  With the passion of a thousand fiery suns.

Awhile ago one of my friends described herself as an “offensive player” in a post and it stuck with me because that totally describes me, too.  I’d much rather figure out what I want, go for it, and let the chips fall where they may then sit around just reacting to life.

I’m not saying this strategy has always been ideal.  Actually, what I should say is that listening to my gut has never steered me wrong.  Never.  It’s when I didn’t listen to my gut, or it said something I didn’t want to hear, or started speaking fucking French to me and I had no idea what it was trying to say, that I got in big trouble.

And when I fuck up, I like to do it right.  Getting divorced, totalling my practically brand new car.

Go big or go home.

Also? I care way too much what people think about me.  The irony is that it’s the wrong people.  I cringe more at criticism from someone who doesn’t even know me than I do from someone who actually knows me and is probably just trying to stop me from fucking up.

Good luck with that, by the way.  Many have tried and failed.

By far, the best example of this is my first marriage.  On some level, I knew it was a mistake.  So did everyone else.

We got married outside and the “aisle” was a set of steps that I walked down into a garden. It was all happiness and giddy nervousness as my bridesmaids were walking down the aisle.

But, when I got to the top step, I froze.  And not just because I had to wait for the right music.

I literally could not move.  My heart was racing, my throat was dry, and I felt like I was about to fall off the edge of a cliff.  I remember slowly turning to look at my dad, which made me notice all the people down there, standing and staring up at me.  Waiting.  Not for me to run away but to come down there and get married like I promised to do.

When I finally looked at my dad, I’m pretty sure the look on his face was hopeful anticipation. I think he may have even been holding his car keys in his tux pocket, just in case.

But, I ignored my instincts and walked down the aisle straight to bankruptcy and divorce court not two years later.

Where was I going with this?

Oh, did I forget to mention that I’m still only sleeping in 4-5 hour increments?  I’m pretty sure I’m officially insane now.  I’m also pretty sure that should entitle me to some sort of good medication.

Anyway. My life the last year or so has consisted of a whole lot of things happening to me that I couldn’t have done anything to prevent.  Getting laid off, having increasingly worse health problems, wanting to start a family, wanting to move.

I’m not used to being in this situation.  I’m a problem solver.  When something “goes wrong” I’m all about figuring how to make it right again.  Acceptance? Not an option.  It can always be fixed.

Except when it can’t.  And now I’m getting a big fat pile of “when it can’t” flying at me from every direction.  Presumably from some sort of fan.

So instead of sitting around just waiting, I decided to try to find my personality again.  It’s around here somewhere, but it’s slowly gotten chipped away as I’ve struggled to find my identity after not working for over a year, as I’ve dealt with increasingly worse health and pain issues, as I’ve watched key parts of my support system drift away.

The old me would have taken all this even, head on.  She would have said, “Oh, change everything about my life? All at the same time? With some loss issues and fatigue and pain to boot? Heck yes! I’m ON IT.” And she would have been.

But I’m not.  I’m exhausted.  I’m frustrated.  I’m pissed off.

The good news is I still have just enough of my shit together to see what I can do about it.  First off, I’m going to do that thing we’re supposed to do when shitty things happen – you know, what is the lesson I’m supposed to learn here? How can I find the good in all this?

This challenge I’m going through with a group of friends, while painful, has encouraged me to make some changes I’ve needed to make for a while.  And to be honest, I’m finding my faith growing stronger as I rekindle some pursuits I used to be really passionate about.  And good at.  It feels nice to be good at something again.

I also noticed that I’ve slowly abandoned everything creative I used to do, other than making up some recipes here and there.  I’ve been reading the same book for the last 6 months and the only thing that has prompted me to finally finish it is joining a book club.

I hardly have any hobbies anymore. Some of this is because I just physically can’t do some of the things I used to like to do until I have my surgery. But that doesn’t mean I can’t replace them with other activities that I am able to do now.

I’ve already noticed a positive difference, but there’s a long way to go.  I’m still pretty worried, and focused on the negative, and tending to fall completely apart at the slightest provocation.

But every day it gets a little bit easier.

Tags: coping skills, dealing with change, limbo, waiting

This entry was posted by Cathy on Wednesday, February 10th, 2010 at 3:17 pm and is filed under Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.